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Monday, 12 June 2017

Weak and wobbly leadership against the national interest

One of the main themes of my General Election coverage was how much of the Tory campaign consisted of reality-reversing propaganda. At the time it may not have seemed so obvious to the 13.6 million who actually voted for Theresa May, but how ridiculously obvious is it now?Just look at this Tory propaganda poster that they spammed all over the Internet. Look how absolutely backwards it is.Strong and StableTheresa May throwing the Northern Ireland Peace process onto her bonfire of vanity in order to gain a tiny minority in parliament is extraordinary. There's absolutely no way that the Tories can pretend that the UK government is any kind of independent arbiter in the peace process if they've invited one side of the dispute to join them in government, which would be an incredibly foolish move at the best of times, but under the current situation in Northern Ireland (political stalemate, the most polarised it's been since 1998) it's absolute insanity.

I guess that Theresa May has deemed the forcing of her Tory MPs to wear a reeking orange order millstones of bigotry for as long as the Tory-DUP agreement holds together and beyond is a price worth paying for her vanity too.

Then there's the fact that Theresa May threw her two closest advisers under the public opinion bus because her own MPs were threatening a leadership challenge if she didn't. If that isn't proof of her weak leadership I don't know what is. She's determined to cling to power, and if that means dancing to other people's tune, she'd rather do that than let go.The national interestThe idea that the billionaire-bankrolled Tory party would ever rule in the national interest, rather than in the interest of the mega-rich is such political naivety it should hardly need explaining again. Just follow the money for yourself and consider what kind of influence these vast tax-dodger donations are intended to buy.The first Survation post-election poll showed a remarkable swing towards Labour to a 45-39 lead.I don't usually pay a lot of attention to opinion polls, but Survation were the polling company that came closest to accurately predicting the outcome of Theresa May's vanity election (they predicted 41-40, the result was 42-40). If Labour came so close to beating the Tories from so far back in the polls (-11 according to Survation, and up to -25 according to other polling companies) just imagine what could happen if they went into an election on +6 or higher.Tory MPs know that if they call another election now they're likely to face the kind of electoral wipe-out they were giddily expecting to inflict on Labour just two months ago when they gave Theresa May the green light to call her vanity election.It's obviously in the national interest to have a strong government for the Brexit negotiations, but the Tories are driven by such fanatical self-interest that they'd rather flounder around trying to govern from the position of weakness they wilfully put themselves into, rather than give the electorate a 2nd chance to elect a stable government.The rising balloonThe problem for the Tories is that they're only going to make things worse and worse for themselves by trying to cling onto power so desperately. They're risking the peace process in Northern Ireland by inviting one side into the UK government; they'll be forcing their MPs to wear the millstone of orange order bigotry around their necks for as long as the sordid DUP deal goes on and beyond; and they're already facing an apparently impossible demographic future, hated as they are by the younger generations.But the one standout thing is that every single day longer that they try to cling onto power is another clear demonstration that they're putting the Tory party interest miles above the national interest.They're holding onto a rising balloon, and the longer they wait until they let go, the further they will have to drop.If this mess goes on throughout the summer and into the winter, by the spring they'll likely be facing an electoral wipe out to make 1997 look like a kiddies' picnic in the park.

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